


not even you can trouble or betray

by OfShoesAndShips



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: M/M, i'm baaaaaaack!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-21
Updated: 2017-11-06
Packaged: 2019-01-20 20:42:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12441360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OfShoesAndShips/pseuds/OfShoesAndShips
Summary: The figure stood and now even through the darkness Norrell knew him; the breadth of his shoulders, the tiny bowing of his knees as he walked, the particular, well-worn movements his hands made as he filled his pipe and lit it as he and Brewer walked to the stables.





	1. Chapter 1

The heavy, wet, faintly irregular clanking of hooves on the gravel path echoed up and through the open window into the library. It was a common enough sound that Norrell did not at first look up from his book; he reached the end of his paragraph before he even truly heard it. Even for a few moments after that, he didn't realise anything was wrong. But the high, ungreased scream of the gate startled him and he stood up, dropping his book on the desk and edging over to the window.

These days the darkness hung thin, stretched out over Hurtfew and her surrounding fields like a low morning mist. Fairie began where the Hurt had lain, curving through the orchard and forming the field boundary. The old road only began at the boundary, half the Hurt bridge appearing at the edge of the darkness and flowing into the newly weed-strewn, gravel-laden track. Norrell was almost too scared to look at the gate, should he see something he oughtn't; but slowly he followed the meandering line of the track until his gaze reached the gate. A tall figure stood at the open gate on the houseward side, but by the hinges; the figure bent, growing unclear as the wind stirred the darkness. The gate closed silently, and the figure's horse walked backward a step, turning to face the house. He neighed, and Norrell clutched the windowsill. He hadn't realised, until this moment, how well he knew the strange creak of Brewer's neigh. The figure stood and now even through the darkness Norrell knew him; the breadth of his shoulders, the tiny bowing of his knees as he walked, the particular, well-worn movements his hands made as he filled his pipe and lit it as he and Brewer walked to the stables.

The edge of the windowsill cut into his palms. He opened his mouth to shout through the open window, half-turned to shout to Strange; but he found he could no more speak than move. He was frozen at the window, ensnared, and from below him he heard the stable door shut. The sound was carried to him through the mist as loud as if he had been there, surrounded by the soft, warm, claggy scent of hay. But after that there was silence, a long, uneasy stretch, and Norrell stumbled from the window to his chair before the fire. He clasped his hands together in his lap, and could feel them shaking. His breath was shallow and fast, his head spinning and a low vibration at the back of his skull that spoke of a headach to come. He slowly bowed forward, his body folding until his forehead rested against his hands. Obsessively he rubbed his thumb back and forth over the opposite palm, leaning his weight on his toes and bouncing his heels against the floor. His rapid gasps for breath did not slow but became more desperate, ever more desperate until he felt that he would have fallen if he still stood.

The window closed with a sharp report and Norrell startled, looking up; Childermass was walking from the window in sodden greatcoat and muddy boots, his hair loose and dripping to darken the soft white fabric of his cravat. Fast, fine-fingered hands unbuttoned his coat as he crossed the library to a far bookcase. His path took him past the chair opposite Norrell and he didn’t pause in his stride as he shrugged out of the coat and tossed it across the chairback. Norrell opened his mouth to protest the cavalier treatment, but again his breath froze in his chest and betrayed him. Childermass was running his finger across the spines on one of the shelves, murmuring under his breath. He reached the end of the shelf and tapped the last spine twice, looked up and down.

“You moved Machen,” Childermass said, and at the sound of his voice Norrell swayed back, collapsing against the chair.

He sounded like he always had, that low, dark voice soft and steady and sharp only at the very edges. It had been so long since the library rang with his echoes, and for a moment Norrell felt himself steady as the noise of Hurtfew became once more what it had been for so long.

“Jonathan argued that it belonged with folklore, not law,” Norrell said, the words falling from him too quickly, too darkly. He almost expected to find toads falling from his mouth with them, or rose petals as in the stories of Col Tom Blue; but all that happened was that Childermass scoffed.

“And you believed him?” he asked, walking the few yards to the case of folklore books. He found the Machen in a trice and tugged it out from where it was squeezed in just a little too tightly.

 _It was you who could follow magical law_ , Norrell thought, _not me_ , but the admission was too much for him to voice. 

Childermass’s shoulders fell, just a little, and his head turned just slightly as if had begun to look back and thought better of it. He opened the book, wandering to Norrell’s desk and leaning one hip against the side as he skimmed what were probably the contents.

He should call for Strange. But he would not be able to make his voice carry, and the bell-pull was on Childermass’s side of the room.

Childermass was humming now, as he flicked through the book; Norrell knew the tune, though words for it escaped him. One of the old folk songs he had once dug through for the memory of spells, he thought, a song of love and murder.

Still humming, Childermass circled the desk and sat in Norrell’s chair, pulling a piece of paper toward him and making notes.

Norrell could find no indignation; Childermass’s own desk had, over these few months of darkness, become Strange’s, and it seemed something almost natural for Childermass to gravitate to the one that was still as it always had been.

“What are you looking for?” he found himself asking. It had always been easiest to talk of books.

“Precedent,” Childermass replied, not looking up.

Norrell wished he would. He wished Childermass’s eyes would find his, he wished he could remind himself of the sardonic curving lip, the creases he had watched form, the nose a falling book had broken when they were first creating the library.

But Childermass’s gaze never moved from his book, and Norrell couldn’t find another word.


	2. Chapter 2

Childermass stood up, though not quietly; Norrell was gazing into the dwindling fire and didn’t look up as he moved. Norrell gripped the arms of the chair in both hands, digging his short, blunt nails into the brocade. The book closed with a low, soft thump; he didn’t let himself look up as Childermass walked around his field of vision to put the it back with the collection of law books. He opened his mouth a little, jaw working, but he had no words and no voice to speak with.

 _John_ , he thought, and felt the fabric strain under his nails, _John_ -

He felt Childermass’s eyes on him, caught in his peripheral vision Childermass’s hand passing a bare inch from his. But he moved silently now, ghostly, and Norrell screwed his eyes tight shut as his breath began to rush and tension turned to tears in his eyes.

He opened them to see the library door swinging shut. “John,” he whispered, too late.

 

-

 

Norrell wandered the halls of Hurtfew in a daze, drifting to and fro along well-trodden corridors and through dusty rooms; almost lost in his own labyrinth, though never quite. His knees were shaking, and only stilled by pacing; back and forth across the smooth and still-shining floor of the ballroom. It hadn’t been used since his uncle’s early years, before Norrell had arrived, before his uncle had given up society for his books and his sister’s son. It was wide and high, and Norrell heard Drawlight’s boyish voice in his ear begging for a party. He could almost see them; ladies in white linen and men in dark suits of the new style, royal blue and rich green. Himself, standing at the edge of the room in an old suit and an ancient wig, looking like a stray fragment of the past. Mr Strange would have no compunctions; his hair wild and free, a suit of soft purples and deep, longing greys. And Norrell would watch him dance until he could feel the atmosphere start to change, when he would run from the ballroom and out into the street and the frozen air. Childermass would follow him, somehow, appearing from somewhere and standing there just behind him. Smoke from his pipe reminding Norrell of his library, and the warmth of a hand against his back.

Childermass had felt the atmosphere change, Norrell thought, as he slammed the ballroom door shut and made his way back into the bowels of the house. He had run for cold air and pipe smoke, and Norrell let himself fall against the wall and clapped his hands across his face.

He slipped to the floor like a child, sitting in the dark corridor with his head in his hands. Distantly he could hear wind clattering the windows in their frames, and a rumble of distant thunder. The library door opening and shutting sent a soft ripple through the labyrinth and Norrell lifted his head, his chest tightening.

“Gilbert?” Jonathan shouted, his voice sounding as if it came to his ears through fog.

Norrell opened his mouth to call back, but again could make no sound. Low, spreading light encroached on the darkness, and Norrell tried to scramble to his feet but could not find the energy. Slow footsteps approached, and Jonathan appeared at the end of the corridor, soft blue light cradled in his hands.

“Gilbert?” his voice was soft with concern now, and his approach was careful.

“Childermass,” Norrell mumbled, stupidly, and clenched his hands.

“He’s gone,” Jonathan said, reaching out and taking one of Norrell’s hands, “Come.”

Norrell shook his head, though with Jonathan’s help he stood. “I saw him.”

Jonathan looked at him, startlement in his eyes. Then his expression cleared and he smiled. “I saw many people who were not there, after the Peninsula.”

“He spoke to me.”

“Ghosts do, sometimes.”

Norrell stopped dead and pulled Jonathan around by the grip Jonathan still had on his wrist. “I am hardly in the habit of having visions, Jonathan.”

“If the Darkness had a new guest, we would both know it.”

Norrell snatched his hand out of Jonathan’s, and rubbed his arms as if the corridors had taken on a chill.

Jonathan sighed. “Where did you see him?”

Norrell pressed his lips together. If this was a weakness he would not indulge it; he would not bear a moment of Jonathan’s humouring tone.

Jonathan’s light flickered, and as it did Norrell caught a waft of pipe smoke. The muffled sound of footsteps, and a shadow across the wall. As soon as the shadow passed the light came back at full strength and Jonathan laughed.

“You’ll have me seeing spirits next.”

“I wish you would not mock me, Mr Strange.”

He could hear Jonathan breathe in deeply, and then let the breath go in a sigh. “I apologise. Will you forgive me enough to join me for dinner?”


End file.
